• In his second OHL season, Nurse led Sault Ste. Marie with 116 penalty minutes and finished second on the team with a plus-15 rating. His 41 points (12-29--41) ranked third among Greyhounds defensemen.

• Nurse was named the Ontario Hockey League’s Scholastic Player of the Year for 2012-13 after carrying an 85% average in six Grade 12 University Prep courses. Previous winners of the award include NHL stars Dustin Brown (2001-03), Steven Stamkos (2006-07) and Matt Duchene (2008-09).

• He won gold with Team Canada at the 2012 Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament and bronze at the 2012 Under-18 World Championship. He also won bronze with Team Ontario at the 2012 World Under-17 Hockey Challenge and was selected to the tournament All-Star Team.

• Nurse comes from an athletic family – his father, Richard, played wide receiver for Hamilton in the Canadian Football League; his mother, Cathy, starred with the McMaster Marauders basketball team in Hamilton, Ont.; his older sister, Tamika, played basketball at Oregon and Bowling Green; and his younger sister, Kia, has represented both Ontario and Canada in basketball. His uncle is former NFL quarterback Donovan McNabb and his aunt, Raquel Nurse, is a former Syracuse basketball standout.

• He played minor hockey with the Don Mills Flyers (2008-11) alongside fellow draft prospect Max Domi (No. 19-ranked North American Skater) and he played on his first hockey team, the Lawfield Lightning, at the age of five.

• Nurse likes to play the guitar in his spare time away from the rink.